BOLA DEL MUNDO, Spain (AP) — Jonas Vingegaard is poised to win the Spanish Vuelta cycling race after increasing his lead on Saturday’s decisive stage, a mountain trek that was briefly disrupted by another anti-Israel protest .
The Vuelta will be Vingegaard’s third Grand Tour title, adding to Dane’s pair of Tour de France titles won in 2022 and 2023.
Vingegaard won Saturday’s 165-kilometer (102-mile) mountain stage ending atop the beyond-category Bola del Mundo ascent in 3 hours, 56 minutes.
The leader of Visma-Lease a Bike dropped top rival João Almeida and the remainder of the hardiest chasers on the final kilometers of the brutal uphill push with gradients of 20%.
Almeida finished fourth, 22 seconds behind. That meant Vingegaard extended his advantage over Almeida to 1 minute, 16 s